Reviews for Olivier Bosman

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I got up early that morning. I entered the breakfast room five minutes after it opened. I wanted to beat Eric to it. I wanted to be the one to tell him to fuck off when he pulled up a chair at my table. I sat at my table at five past, sipping coffee and nibbling on a croissant. I was engrossed by that croissant. How did they make them so delicious? I was busy dissecting the different pastry layers when a voice suddenly spoke to me.”Mother never taught you not to play with your food?”

It was Eric, towering over me. His rosy face looked freshly scrubbed, his hair tightly combed, his white silk shirt freshly ironed, his beige chinos pressed. Before I could do anything to prevent it, he pulled up a chair and sat down before me.

“Where is Petra?” I asked.

“She’s gone to her friend’s hen do. Probably won’t see her again till Christmas.”

He lifted his arm and clicked his fingers at the waiter. “Coffee, please. Black. And… um… eggs. Scrambled.” Then he shooed the waiter away with his hand.

How rude, I thought. This was a side of Eric I hadn’t seen before.

“How was your little drive yesterday?” I made no attempt at hiding the bitterness in my voice.

“It was good. We drove along the coast and had a long good chat.”

“What about?”

“About you, as it happens.”

“Me?”

He sat up and cleared his throat. “I… um… I want to ask you a question. I wanted to ask you last night in your room. But you were sleeping.”

“What do you want to ask?”

He hesitated for a few beats. Then he blurted it out. “Would you like to marry me?”

Well! I don’t need to tell you that I was shocked. I gaped at him silently. Perplexed..

“This isn’t a proposal, you understand,” he added hurriedly. “I’m not asking you to marry me. Not yet. I can’t without the permission of my father and my government. But I’m asking you whether marrying me is something you would consider.”

“Are you serious?”

“Yes. I had a long chat about it with Petra. She said she talked to you last night. She likes you. She said you’d make a good partner for me.”

“But we only talked for about ten minutes.”

“Well, she’s a good judge of character. She saw the same good qualities in you as I did.”

“What good qualities?”

“Your confidence. Your self-assuredness.”

“But I have no confidence.”

“Of course you do. I mean, look at you. You’re poor, you’re Welsh, you’re not particularly good looking, and yet you’re sitting here in the smartest hotel in Brighton as if you had every right to do so.”

“Wow! You really know how to sweep a boy off his feet!”

“No, you don’t understand. These are things that I like about you.”

“That I’m not particularly good looking?”

“What I meant was…” He shook his head. “This conversation isn’t going at all the way I planned it. What I mean was that you’re grounded. You’re down to earth. You don’t care what people think of you. Otherwise you wouldn’t be wearing that.”

“What?”

“That hoodie. This is the Pavillion Hotel, not a hip-hop bar in Brooklyn.”

“Do you want me take it off?”

“No. You don’t understand. I like that about you. I like that you snubbed the nice clothes I bought for you and chose to wear your council estate gear instead. I like that you come down for breakfast without even bothering to comb your hair. I like your ordinariness. Your earthiness. You’re a working class kid with the balls and intelligence to break out of your environment and compete with us rich kids. And you outshine us. Not with your clothes, or your wit, or your family name, but by being yourself. That’s what I like about you. And that’s what I want standing beside me when I’m king. Petra thinks so too, and she’s an excellent judge of character.”

I was flabbergasted. Never had I felt so insulted and complimented at the same time! I’d read Petra wrong.

“Well?” Eric asked.

“What?” I’d long forgotten what the original question was. I was still reeling from his speech. You outshine us. That was the nicest thing anyone had ever said to me.

“Would you consider marrying me?” he said. “Or rather, what I’m asking is whether you’d be willing to be my right hand man. We’d be the first gay royal couple in history. We’d do all those things that you talked about in the car. Be ambassadors to gay rights and so forth. But it won’t be easy. We’ll be hated by many. There’ll be insults, ridicule, maybe even death threats. And that’s only if our marriage is approved by King and parliament, which will be a whole battle in itself. But one I’m willing to fight if you are by my side. So what do you think? Will you consider it? Will you be the next Prince Consort of Doggerland? Will you be my husband?”

Doggerland Trilogy

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